July 11th, 2014

[ADDENDUM: I noticed a discussion in the comments section about how it is that someone like Pelosi retains her power and manages to fool so many voters.

My impression—gleaned mainly from liberal friends of mine, particularly women but not limited to women—is that most people do not follow the topics closely and therefore take what Pelosi is saying at face value, as a fair statement of the facts of the SCOTUS decision or anything else she might describing. After all, isn’t she a woman? (These liberal friends are predisposed to trust women more than men, although I see no evidence of why that should be.) Isn’t she a liberal Democrat? (This likewise defines her as better and more trustworthy than a conservative Republican, although I see no evidence of why that should be.) Isn’t she a woman and liberal Democrat who rose to a very high position and is therefore particularly capable? (This defines her as especially intelligent, although I see no evidence of why that should be.) And if she were lying, wouldn’t the MSM point that out? (This defines the MSM as truthful, although I see no evidence of why that should be).

And Faux News? It can be discounted and never watched, and is only mentioned in order to be mocked.]

40 Responses to “Megyn Kelly vs. Nancy Pelosi”

She (Pelosi) knows *exactly* what she’s doing. She knows *exactly* what (and how — and *why*) she’s misrepresenting.

It’s time for us to stop acting as though it’s our side debating their side, each side presenting pros and cons as though it’s a high school or college debate . . .

and it’s time for us to change the *frame* of the debate — no, it’s really not a “debate” but a propaganda platform — to one in which our side calls out the other side as to the big lie, and specifically points out *exactly* what the other side is doing — and *why*. Again and again and again, every time it happens, until something sinks in with the low information citizenry.

It is amazing and disconcerting that Pelosi seems to lie with impunity. I watched Megyn, and she certainly took her to task; but, Megyn’s viewers are relatively few in numbers. There is no way of knowing how many people heard Pelosi,, without comment, through other outlets, and just nodded in agreement.

I know that the residents of SF are “different” from most of America, but one marvels that they are so stupid, or doctrinaire, that they would continue to let her represent them. No shame. It would be interesting to see a demographic profile for her district. I wonder just which segment of SF it represents.

But, why single out Pelosi and SF, eh? There are Harry Reid and Nv; and any number of other examples of idiocy.

“I know that the residents of SF are “different” from most of America, but one marvels that they are so stupid, or doctrinaire,”

We marvel at how illogical it appears to us, but it’s not based wholly upon logic. I offer that it is neither stupidity nor ideology (at least from a studied ideology). I think, and have said before on this blog, that it is a deeply ingrained belief system built from many differing inputs.

Such a belief system is more intimate than even sex. No wonder its difficult to inspire change.

Let me give you an anecdotal example. I live in the Pittsburgh (PA) area; a solidly blue-social-order, blue-collar Democrat town. The Dem party here is in many ways still the remains of the JFK/LBJ/Tip O’Neill Democrat party. You can say what you want about the dramatic leftward swing of national Democrats, but that doesn’t play in this Peoria because the local party still functions, in many ways, like the party did 50 years ago.

This just reinforces the belief system (albeit mythical) that: 1) Nothing has changed, really; and 2) the Democrats are still the party of the “working man” and the middle class. Furthermore, the local Republican party, suffering from its own version of a rectal-cranial inversion, has done absolutely nothing to counteract this myth.

As Tip O’Neill himself noted: “ALL Politics is local,” and it is that local lens lens through which much of the national playing field is seen not only be low-information voters, but by even more experienced voters who are forced to work within that system because it’s the only game in town.

T – I’m in the Pittsburgh area too and I always say that the voters here are socially Conservative, but always vote Democrat. My father was one such voter – union member, Republicans are for the rich, etc. But he’d roll over in his grave if he could see what’s going on.

Old joke. stop me if you heard it before: an Irish-American kid from Philadelphia grows up, moves to the suburbs, and becomes a Republican. One election day he’s back in the city to drive his mother to the polls. He asks Mom, who are you voting for? For the Democrat, of course, she says. I swear, Mom, if Jesus Christ were running you’d still vote for the Democrat. “Don’t be daft, boy,” says Mom. “Why would He be changing parties now?”

I agree, the voters in this area are socially conservative. They’re the “bitter clingers” Obama condescendingly referred to from the West coast, but as we agree, they always vote Dem.

When you look at it nationally it makes no sense, but when you take a microscope and examine the trend locally it makes all the sense in the world.

The Dem party has been very effective at segregating its own national trends from local myths (the party of the “working class”), and emphasizing national myth (the party of “the rich,” the “war” on women, etc.) as a local trend for the Republican opposition).

That’s why I’m befuddled by conservative criticism of Boehner’s potential lawsuit against the president (think Andrew McCarthy here). Some call it a political stunt and it might be, but it’s precisely the kind of political stunt that the Dems are so effective at using against conservatives. Andrew McCarthy thinks it’s useless politicizing because there’s no chance that it can bear results, but he fails to understand that the effect may be in simply bringing and pursuing the lawsuit rather than in any intended results. it’s certainly a better national play than Palin (whom I respect, by the way) calling for Obama’s impeachment which IMO has absolutely no conservative upside whatsoever

(LisaM, BTW I am in the city proper, what part of the area are you in?)

I never studied law, but I could follow with no trouble the issues involved in the Hobby Lobby case. Nancy Pelosi writes laws and she can’t figure it out. She is a disgrace to women, not only for being stupid but also for being an immoral, lying, botoxed b***h.
Megyn did a great job. I guess that inaddition to studying law, she may have also taken a logic course somewhere in her past.

I also remember a story about a fellow from a staunchly Dem immigrant family announcing that he was going to vote for Reagan. When asked why he responded: “The Democrats allowed me to become middle class, but Reagan will allow me to remain middle class.”

Prescient and prophetic now that we’re reduced to discussing the squeezing of the middle class between the Dem core constituencies of the wealthy liberal rich and the urban poor.

Pelosi doesn’t need to fool many voters. She’s continually elected by the voters of a very small piece of property in the San Francisco Bay area (think Berkeley and Marin County) where they overwhelmingly think just the way she does.

That’s why she’ll be on the national stage until she voluntarily chooses to retire (like that’ll ever happen).

Right, this is precisely what the Progressive left and Islamists have in common. western culture is their common enemy — it’s no wonder the left never criticizes anything Islamic (that plus cowardice).

In practice, lawyers are paid to argue any side of the issue. But they must do it with logic, although sometimes if a case is weak they strain logic. But they are very aware they’re doing it. And learning logic certainly doesn’t keep them from lying through their teeth if need be (see this).

I was always very logical, even as a little girl. I was teased about it quite a bit. And studying law made me even more logical (and perhaps even more infuriating to those near and dear).

She’s continually elected by the voters of a very small piece of property in the San Francisco Bay area (think Berkeley and Marin County) where they overwhelmingly think just the way she does.

It’s just like Democrat plantations. Back in the aristocratic South, circa 1840-1860, slave owners not only were 1% of the pop but had 99% of the voting power, mostly because each slave counted as a slice for voting, and the more slices you had, the more voting power you had. The more blacks and migrant workers on the modern Democrat 21st century plantation, the more voting power they have.

All of the imagined reasons neo offers for why the voters in her district keep reelecting Pelosi are plausible rationalizations, they are what the voters use as justification.

The motivation however is more visceral. Those who vote for Pelosi, Reid, Obama, etc. do so because they believe, on an emotional level that the Democrat’s support, the voter’s views.

They also are convinced that Republicans oppose, at a basic level, their viewpoints. Democrats have successfully demonized those who vote Republican.

Those who vote Democrat have swallowed the left’s ‘kool-aid’, they have invested themselves in the Democrat’s propaganda both that Democrats are the ‘people’s champions’ and that Republicans are reactionary and selfish.

T – I’m in New Castle. It’s a dying city with closed, rusty mills everywhere. My dad grew up here (although I did not) and my grandfather was one of the blue-collar workers who worked themselves into the ground and would have been offended at the idea that government should feed his family. I can see their little house out of my office window and I think of them every day. He could either afford a house in the country or a car. He chose the house, because it was best for his kids, and then he walked several miles to and from work every day. Here’s to the bitter clingers!

Forgot to add that after growing up with role models such as those, I married a man in the Navy and moved to the San Francisco Bay area. I remember being utterly flabbergasted at what I saw and heard there. It was like another world. I’ve since lived all over the country and I still think that.

Good job by Megyn Kelly. Glad she mentioned Harry Reid’s howler that “five white men” decided the Hobby Lobby case because I’d somehow completely missed that in all this. I guess because the MSM just didn’t notice, right?

These will make great campaign commercials! esp Hillary, scroll the sixteen forms of birth control that are covered, then play Hillary or Pelosi saying the opposite. Point out that she is an attorney, who cant read a law properly.

I lived first in her district, then the 2nd, just north. The people who vote for her, and her fellow crazy Democrats* DO NOT CARE. We had one assembly seat primary where Crazy, Crazier, and Craziest were running against each other. Since it was for the Democratic ticket (pre-open primary times.) Whoever won the Democratic nomination was GOING to win the the office. Craziest came close to winning, but Crazier pulled out off. Crazy would have been preferable.

* I’m not saying ALL Democrats are crazy, but on California, they LOVE ’em that way.

Kaba, the same thing happened to my dad in the 50’s on his way to a ship in the Korean War. He was in a movie theater and another man ran his hand up my dad’s thigh. Let’s just say he didn’t take it well. 🙂

BO, Pelosi and the rest of the Left are not competent and are not logical, but they are not stupid.

With the soviet media as the flickering illumination, they are gas-lighting.

One of the unheralded, unappreciated and utterly brilliant gifts given by Rush, is the frequent use on his show of a dozen or so clips from the media where the same phrase is repeated by various “journalists” on a particular issue.

Rush, to my knowledge, has never made a comment on these segments. He just plays them.

Example: the word “gravitas” being used with reference to Bush. Within 24 hours Wolf and Andrea and Diana and the rest of the crowd all came up with the word “gravitas.”

Rush has done this many times (dozens, scores??).

Rush does not comment because any comment necessarily makes the commentator look ridiculous. How can anyone prove that the repetition isn’t a coincidence?

The precise object of gas-lighting is to make the enemy or victim look crazy by casting things in such a way where a statement of the truth by the enemy or victim looks like a mental aberration.

There is absolutely no inconsistency about a message which appeals to the lo-fo, stimulates the tuned-in, deranged cognoscenti, and makes any response by the truthful look crazy and extreme.

Contrast: Rush can merely present the facts without comment, Pelosi can broadcast the malign fantasy without fear of contradiction.

LisaM,
Yup, I wandered the streets my first night there. I was propositioned 3 times. One was by a professional lady; the second by a man; and the third was a coin-toss. The interesting part was visiting Haight Ashbury. All kinds of rare and exotic creatures there in 1969.

The independence that government offers the malcontents, the misanthropes, the marauders follows the money they demand of you and me. It is time to say, hey, Mr. Government, you cannot take from me to give to my enemies or even to obliquely support their causes. Therefore, I will attempt every method to deprive you of your revenue. This will be my jihad and I will use taqqiya, the art of deception. I will declare you are my great and powerful benefactor while at the same time sup at your teat and not pay anything. Do you like me so far. You must. You are supporting all Muslim causes. I’m going to turn that funnel against you. I will rejoice, exalt and celebrate your reverses, demises and hardship. They shall be as life to me, and when the final battle is declared, you will be so weak that you cannot defend yourself. You belong to me, as you always have. You are my servant. I declare now my right of ownership, my right of management, my right of representation as stated in the Constitution.

Today Charles C.W. Cooke has an excellent essay on precisely this topic:

At present, Obama is unrestrained, happily enjoying the inherent advantages of the executive branch and secure in the knowledge that his antagonists are faced with a choice between doing nothing and declaring all-out war. John Boehner may not have worked out a way to make bring his rival to a halt, but he may have found a promising middle course, . . .

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Previously a lifelong Democrat, born in New York and living in New England, surrounded by liberals on all sides, I've found myself slowly but surely leaving the fold and becoming that dread thing: a neocon. Read More >>